Portland

Tuesday
The remainder of our trip we spent in Portland, staying at Sarah and Mike’s and celebrating Thanksgiving with them and Josh’s parents. The first night there Sarah took us to a little taco place called Porque No? that was both tasty and relatively inexpensive. Afterward Sarah and Mike took Josh and I to a brewpub called Lucky Lab, where you can actually bring your dogs. My friend, Lynn, who lives in Portland, was able to meet up with us briefly. We then stopped at The Hub, where the other three got the beer sampler – of 10 mini glasses of beer! I played it safe and got a great merlot called “The Velvet Devil.” Sarah & Mike had planned a few other brewpubs for us to stop at, but it had been a long day and we were eager to go to bed, so home we went. Nicely – and unnecessarily – Sarah and Mike gave us their room the whole time we were there. I’m sure they were quite happy to have us go :)

Wednesday
We grabbed breakfast someplace and then went and toured the Japanese Garden. Very beautiful, serene place. Also stopped by the rose garden since it was right there, but since it was late fall there really weren’t any roses. We did a little window shopping and lunch in the 23rd & Hawthorne District, then headed back to Sarah’s for a nap. On the way we stopped at VooDoo Doughnut and I have to say the experience was somewhat underwhelming. Portland is a much larger city than I expected – much larger than Minneapolis-St. Paul, and seemed very crowded to me.

We went to Belly Timber for dinner, where we celebrated Fay’s birthday. The drinks there were excellent. Doug had something on his plate that none of us could identify, but all tasted it and most thought it was earthy but good. Turns out it was blood sausage. None of us ate it anymore after that! Stopped at Cold Stone for dessert and then back to Sarah’s for wine.

Thursday
Thursday was Thanksgiving – and Fay’s birthday. Luckily for most of us, Sarah and Fay decided to do all the work preparing the feast, so we all got to go out and play! Mike took us outside of the city to Maltnomeh Falls and Horsetail Falls, and took us on the Washington side of the Columbia River. It is really a gorgeous area and they have the coolest trees – both the giant cedars and also these cool, mossy trees. Almost seemed like a fairy tale, with lots of cool fog. We didn’t even mind bumming around out in the rain. Sometime I’d like to check out the Oregon Trail Museum here. When we got home dinner was almost ready and, I might add, delicious.

Friday
Friday was wine tasting day in the Willamette Valley. Mike’s parents joined us. We stopped off at the Columbia store first to do some shopping on Sarah’s employee discount, but neither Josh or I found anything we *had* to buy, so we didn’t. The first winery we stopped at was Montinore Estate. Josh and I made a real point of trying lots of pinot noirs this day – 1) that’s what this valley is known for producing, and 2) we aren’t very familiar with pinot so it was a good opportunity to learn. The staff at Montinore were kind of pills, except for the gal who was pouring the dessert wines. We bought two bottles, an unusual white and a dessert. (Sadly, we will probably never get our wine as we assumed Sarah could ship it to us and we left it with her, but apparently shipping wine out of Portland isn’t as easy as shipping it out of Napa Valley. We left her with kind of a hassle and feel badly about that.)

Next up was Whistling Ridge, a small, family-owned winery that Sarah and Mike are big fans of. The family was all very down to earth and easy to talk to. Next up was Stag Hollow, which was probably my favorite place. You got nine tastes and the ninth one was mindblowing. It was also like $240/bottle or something. Rightly so! Our last stop before Mike and his parents had to leave was Lenne’. Again, almost all of the wine pourers we talked with were so nice and helpful and laid back. Such a good time! (Josh probably liked Lenne’ the best because all the women there were gushing about his purple pants!)

Last stop of the day was at Willakenzie Estate, where Sarah is a member. We had a number of good wines there but I think this is the only place where Josh and I didn’t buy any. Not sure why – I think our tastebuds were on grape overload at that point. We stopped for burgers on the way home and otherwise had a mellow evening.

Saturday
Mine and Josh’s plane didn’t leave until late afternoon, so we had a little time to mess around in Portland. We went to breakfast with Sarah at a place called Jam. Good food but ridiculous portion sizes. Four people could have eaten off my plate and there still would have been leftovers. Next we went to the Saturday market, which is kind of like our art fairs but is there every weekend. They had a lot of neat stuff and I bought a necklace, a piece of pottery and a print. I could easily have bought more but behaved. They also had kind of a junky, trinkety part of the fair, but we didn’t hang out there much.

We headed back to Seattle with plenty of time to spare so we didn’t have to worry about any unexpected traffic. We had time to grab an early dinner someplace and decided to try and go back to Paseo, the Cuban sandwich place Kyle had told me about. It was absolutely packed and only took cash, so we walked a few blocks until we found a grocery store with a cash machine. Lucky break as it also carried Dry Soda, something we had seen advertised in Seattle and wanted to try. I bought a bottle of lemongrass and a bottle of quince, and we went back to get our sandwiches.

Kyle did not lie. The sandwiches at this place are heavenly. I had the midnight Cuban, as recommended. (To quote Kyle: “Do you want to have the best sandwich you’ve ever had in your life?”) It is a Cuban roast pork sandwich with banana peppers, smoked ham and Swiss cheese melted together in a hot press. Also giant onions that I picked off. It is a huge sandwich and a helluva bargain at $8. SO. GOOD. We ate our sandwiches and drank our dry soda sitting on a bench outside, and it was a very good way to end our trip! Add to that a Shocktop Belgian White Ale at the airport and we were good to go. Goodybe, Seattle! We had a great time!